Boxes and Bounderies

One of my favourite things about my church is the way we have broken out of the box of what "church" looks like. We have not only broken out, but we've crossed certain boundaries too.

Stop.

Did you noticed the terminology I just used there? Box, boundaries, broken out, crossed. Those words cause me to stop and think a minute. A box has to be broken out of whereas bounderies can just be crossed. There is something significant in that.

I really hate boxes! Bounderies are great. I have bounderies to who I am. You have bounderies to who you are. But for goodness sakes don't try to neatly put me in a box! Bounderies imply space also. Space to roam and grow. Space that hasn't been seen by everyone even me.

A box says, "Here you are. I have you safely contained in these four walls and a lid of who and what I think you are. You can't go anywhere. This is you." The problem with that is it gives me no room to grow, to spread out, to stretch, or to learn. A box has no mystery to discover!

Give me boundaries and I will flourish. I will grow in the space I am given. I will stretch. I will discover hidden things. I may see the sky and decide one day to fly. I may outgrow the boundaries and have to set up new ones. There will be times I'll test the boundaries and maybe even cross them; I will learn.
Who I am is ever changing. My personality is a living thing that needs to have the okay to grow and be shaped by God.

Do not put me in your box of lables; let me roam the fields within my own (God's) boundaries of who I am. Encourage me to grow and ask myself and God who I really am to be. Call me "further up and further in" to who God has designed me to be, but don't be angry or surprised if I choose to stay within my boundaries or instead soar from them.

Even in my changing, growing, stretching, and shaping know that who I am at my core will remain the same. The identity God has given me will not change, it will only be made more firm in all my growing.

Let us learn not to put each other in boxes, but instead be willing to cross some boundaries and learn to love each other where we are.

A Life of Repentance

Before I was a Christian I lived a life of sin, but when I became a Christian I lived a life of repentance. ~A.W.Tozer

On the surface this quote sounds nice, and most of us would agree with it. A lot of times people equate repentance with forgiveness. That thinking is not necessarily wrong, after all, God does say if we will repent He is faithful and just to forgive us our sins. So a lot of people would say, to live a life of repentance is to live a forgiven life and stop there. We cannot just stop, though, there is a deeper meaning to this "life of repentance". You see, repentance does not equal forgiveness. They go together, but they are not the same thing. Repentance is a literal turning away from sin.
Picture it like this. You are walking a path in the woods. As you go farther down to path you reach a split with a sign that says do not enter on one side. You choose the blocked path. As you continue on nothing seems wrong until you suddenly stumble across a bear trap (you know, the kind that can break your leg). You have another choice, keep going or turn back. Perhaps you choose to skirt that trap and continue on, only to find the path and even the woods are filled with them. You realize your error. Now you still have a choice continue forward or turn back. To repent would be to turn back and return to the correct path.
To live a life of repentance takes on a whole new meaning now. Living this life (aka. the Christian life) literally means to stop, confess the sin, seek forgiveness and completely walk away from it, constantly.
No matter the perceived size of the sin, it still has to be done away with. I know this is a hard lifestyle. We as people stumble and fall, but God will forgive us when we ask, and He asks that we repent too. He will pick us up, clean us, and mend the brokenness. He may leave a scar as a reminder, but He is faithful, just, and merciful.

Let us truly live a life of repentance as we constantly turn away from sin.